**5.3. Mechanization for field management**

are also used. Germination capacity of single-bud sett is very poor due to loss of moisture and fungal or bacterial infection from cut ends on either side. Furthermore, the plants arising from single-bud setts also lack vigor and yield lower as compared to those from two- or three-bud setts. The ideal seed cane involved is as follows: (1) half-year seed cane, (2) fine and viable buds without damage and aerial root, (3) free pathogens and pest, and (4) pure in quality.

**Growth phase (d) Nutrition uptake (g/mu) Yield (kg/mu) 0–50 51–100 101–150 151–200 201–250 251–300 301–350**

N 500 765 2625 4750 3950 2250 605 13,463

P 75 201 665 1250 835 205 15 K 265 535 2035 7265 2503 835 665

**Table 4.** Nutrition uptake in different growth phases of sugarcane.

Traditionally, farmers in China obtain the seed cane from their harvested cane and have no any treatments before planting, which results in low plant population per unit area consequently reducing the yield. Since 2000, healthy seed cane program has been developed to protect the sugarcane from soil-borne diseases causing pathogens, which usually gain entry into the setts through the cut ends following planting and cause sett rotting and damage to buds, thus affecting germination. The healthy seed cane was produced by micropropagation,

The healthy seed cane was produced at three stages, i.e., breeder's stock, stock seed cane from micropropagation and commercial seed cane. For micropropagation, no pathogen was detected in the plantlets derived from sugarcane stem tip tissue culture, which is required for mosaic, ratooning stunt, and yellow leaf [21, 22]. Use of pathogen-free healthy seed cane improved cane productivity by 15.1–52.1% and sucrose content by 0.12–1.71% due to control of various diseases such as ratoon stunting disease, mosaic viruses, and yellow leaf disease in the seed cane. However, the application of healthy seed cane (about 2% of total sugarcane plantation) was not satisfactory with respect to the production cost, re-infection in the field,

Three kinds of major disease (smut, ratooning, and grassy shoot) were transferred through seed cane, which could be eliminated by heat-treatment at 52°C for 30 min and organo-mercurial treatment to protect the setts from soil-borne diseases to ensure better germination. To control

**Efficiencies Spray Microspray Dip irrigation Control** N 42.33 50.39 51.32 31.46 P 24.33 29.41 30.21 10.19 K 41.37 51.64 52.11 27.34 Water 67.44 89.24 90.01 —

**Table 5.** Differences of nutrition and water use efficiencies among irrigation ways.

thermos- or chemotherapy.

60 Sugarcane - Technology and Research

and the small-scale farms in China.

With the urbanization in China, labor is becoming scarce, and labor cost is increasing, thereby favoring mechanization for field management in sugarcane production. In the past few years, the labor cost for harvest increased from 30–50 RMB in 2008 to 130–150 RMB per tonnage. Almost 100% mechanization has been attained in soil preparation and in most field operations such as planting, fertilizer application, mulching with trash and plastic film, and weed and pest controls, but very little mechanization is practiced for sugarcane harvesting (**Table 6**).

For higher sugarcane yields, providing optimum soil environment is an essential prerequisite since the crop remains in the field for about 5–6 years due to the practice of raising several ratoon crops [23]. The ideal land should be prepared by the following steps: (i) subsoiling or chiseling to a depth of 50–75 cm, (ii) discing to shatter clods, (iii) plowing the old crop's residues and organic manures, and (iv) constructing the trench or ridge for draining excess water during rainy season. The land preparation also requires 25 cm of furrow depth and 10 cm of the loosened furrow bottom and drainage channels.

It is necessary to harvest sugarcane at a proper time i.e., peak maturity, by adopting right technique in order to realize maximum weight of the millable canes (thus sugar) produced with least possible field losses under the given growing environment. Otherwise, it will cause great losses in cane yield, sugar recovery, poor juice quality, and problems in milling. In China, more than 95% of sugarcane was manually harvested using various types of hand knives or hand axes. Among the several tools, the cutting blade is usually heavier and facilitates easier and efficient cutting of cane. Manual harvesting requires skilled laborers and large amount of labor cost.

In China, harvesting labor is becoming more scarce and costly in view of diversion of labor to other remunerative work in industry, construction, business, etc. (0.5–1 tons per day for one adult). In addition, more and more younger farmers are not interested in the field operations.


**Table 6.** Power requirement and work output for land preparation of sugarcane.

It is reported that only 5% of younger farmers born in 1990s still worked in the field. Mill stoppages are becoming more common because of nonavailability of canes, which are resulted from the shortage of harvesting labor, especially during Chinese Spring Festival. In addition, most of the new mills are of higher crushing capacity and many old mills are expanding their crushing capacities. Therefore, daily requirement of cane is increasing and hence greater demand for harvesting labor. Mechanization is inevitable and hence, adoption of mechanical harvesting of cane is also inevitable in future.

pesticides. A successful integrated pest management (IPM) program helps protect the envi-

Sugarcane Production in China

63

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.73113

Weeds can reduce sugarcane yields by competing for moisture, nutrients, and light during the growing season. Several weed species also serve as alternate hosts for disease and insect pests. These weed species include Coast cockspur (*Echinochloa walteri*), Goosegrass (*Eleusine indica*),

Comprehensive control of diseases, pests, and weeds included resistant sugarcane varieties, pest and pathogen-free healthy seed canes, and green prevention and control practices by integrated managements of physical, chemical, cultural, and biological controls. These green prevention and control practices include as follows: (i) sterilizing seed canes; (ii) removing sources of diseases, pests, and weeds; (iii) using techniques like mechanical trapping in the field; (iv) using pheromone for control of borers, *Trichogramma* and *Cuban flies*; (v) Metarhizium to control termite; (vi) light trapping of borer, longhorn beetle, and scarab; (vii) using herbicide to control pre- and postemergent weed; and (viii) crop rotation for weed control in large scale. Although chemical and biocontrol methods are effective individually, they are not able to give protection throughout the crop period. If a combination of these agents is available, we can expect a treatment with more efficacy and prolonged protection, such as thiophanatemethyl and carbendazim with bacterial (*Pseudomonas*) for *C. falcatum* [33]. As in other methods of disease control in sugarcane, this approach also works prophylactically. Furthermore,

A network for *Trichogramma* production has been set up in Nanning East Asia Sugar Corporation Ltd., Guangxi. All the cards of *Trichogramma* are provided to all the farmers, which resulted in the decrease of borer incidence by 30% and the increase in sucrose content by 0.5% (absolute value). The best practice program for pest and weed management is becoming a potential and cost-saving approach. Over 70 weed species have developed resistance to the triazine herbicides. These biotypes include several members of the genera *Amaranthus*, *Ambrosia*, *Chenopodium*, *Eleusine*,

There were about 5 million farms. The average farm size was about 0.27 ha and produced an average of 18 t cane. Most of planting, weeding, cultivation, fertilizing, spraying, and harvesting were still done by hand. Fertilizer was used excessively, especially nitrogen, at three times over the world average, while the usage efficiency was low. It resulted in soil acidification and degradation as well as in pollution. Most of the sugarcane fields were dry slopes with infertile soil. The average available irrigation was less than 20%. Rainfall distribution was uneven and

In China, sugarcane mechanization is one of the greatest challenges due to the small farm holding and the over requirement of the harvested cane. Most of the sugarcane-growing

ronment, which also possibly saves money for the growers.

Sorghum-almum (*Sorghum almum*) and *Cyperus rotundus*, etc.

repeated application of the bacterial strains is needed to boost the efficacy.

*Panicum*, and *Solanum*, which are commonly found in China sugarcane fields.

**6. New challenges and prospects for sugar industry in China**

seasonal natural disasters such as drought and frost happened frequently.

**6.1. Mechanization**

Compared to the countries, such as Australia, Brazil, USA, South Africa, and Cuba, China has less than 5% of sugarcane harvested by machine. The limitation of mechanical harvesters is use of the large mechanical harvesters in small, irregular and fragmented holdings, diversified cropping patterns, and limited resource capacity of small and marginal farmers in China. In the highly mechanical harvested countries, sugarcane is grown on large plantation scale in large farms owned by either mills or big farmers. The field capacity of mechanical cane harvesters varies with the size (2.5–4 ha per day of 8 h).

#### **5.4. Comprehensive control of diseases, pests, and weeds**

Sugarcane is a major commercial crop grown in tropical and subtropical regions of China, which is cultivated in about 1.3 million ha. During the last 100 years, the country has witnessed epidemics of various diseases like smut, pokkah boeng, red rot, wilt, and yellow leaf. The damage caused to sugarcane during each epidemic depends upon the nature of disease and spread of the susceptible varieties [24, 25]. The incidence of diseases is increasing at an alarming rate, and the yield is declining every year. About 10–15% of the national sugar produced is lost due to diseases in China [26]. Many sugarcane varieties were replaced due to their breakdown to a new disease or to a new pathogenic strain, such as mosaic, foliage disease, and yellow leaf.

Smut, pokkah boeng, and red rot remains to be the major fungal diseases of sugarcane in China, and *Phoma sorghina* var. *saccharum*, *Alternaria* sp. are the new fungal pathogens causing twisted leaves and brown leaf streak diseases in China, respectively [27–31]. Among the viral diseases, mosaic and yellow leaf syndrome are prevalent in almost all parts of the country. Bacterial diseases like ratoon stunting disease (RSD) are found to cause considerable yield loss in China, while leaf scald disease (LSD) and chlorotic streak disease are also identified to be caused by *Xanthomonas albilineans* and *Xanthomonas sacchari*, respectively [32].

Sugarcane is infested by 287 species of insect and noninsect pests. Out of them, 25 are major pests of sugarcane in China. Borers are major pests attacking sugarcane throughout the growth period, including *Tetramoera schistaceana*, *Chilo infuscatellus*, *C. venosatus,* and *Sesamia inferens*, in which *Tetramoera schistaceana* was the predominant species in China. The sugarcane borer causes the serious economic losses in China by tunneling that enters into the stalk for secondary invaders including bacterial and fungal diseases. More than 25% of sugarcane was infected in China, in some cases reaching as high as 98% of sugarcane. Severe incidences of shoot borer are noticed during water shortage and high temperatures. The other insects include white grubs, wireworms, and yellow sugarcane aphid and mites, including resistant cultivars, biological control agents, insect control and prevention, cultural practices, and pesticides. A successful integrated pest management (IPM) program helps protect the environment, which also possibly saves money for the growers.

Weeds can reduce sugarcane yields by competing for moisture, nutrients, and light during the growing season. Several weed species also serve as alternate hosts for disease and insect pests. These weed species include Coast cockspur (*Echinochloa walteri*), Goosegrass (*Eleusine indica*), Sorghum-almum (*Sorghum almum*) and *Cyperus rotundus*, etc.

Comprehensive control of diseases, pests, and weeds included resistant sugarcane varieties, pest and pathogen-free healthy seed canes, and green prevention and control practices by integrated managements of physical, chemical, cultural, and biological controls. These green prevention and control practices include as follows: (i) sterilizing seed canes; (ii) removing sources of diseases, pests, and weeds; (iii) using techniques like mechanical trapping in the field; (iv) using pheromone for control of borers, *Trichogramma* and *Cuban flies*; (v) Metarhizium to control termite; (vi) light trapping of borer, longhorn beetle, and scarab; (vii) using herbicide to control pre- and postemergent weed; and (viii) crop rotation for weed control in large scale.

Although chemical and biocontrol methods are effective individually, they are not able to give protection throughout the crop period. If a combination of these agents is available, we can expect a treatment with more efficacy and prolonged protection, such as thiophanatemethyl and carbendazim with bacterial (*Pseudomonas*) for *C. falcatum* [33]. As in other methods of disease control in sugarcane, this approach also works prophylactically. Furthermore, repeated application of the bacterial strains is needed to boost the efficacy.

A network for *Trichogramma* production has been set up in Nanning East Asia Sugar Corporation Ltd., Guangxi. All the cards of *Trichogramma* are provided to all the farmers, which resulted in the decrease of borer incidence by 30% and the increase in sucrose content by 0.5% (absolute value). The best practice program for pest and weed management is becoming a potential and cost-saving approach. Over 70 weed species have developed resistance to the triazine herbicides. These biotypes include several members of the genera *Amaranthus*, *Ambrosia*, *Chenopodium*, *Eleusine*, *Panicum*, and *Solanum*, which are commonly found in China sugarcane fields.
